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By Jim Edelstein on May 10th 2005, 1:15 am Permalink
Wow it seems like it's been ages since I made it back to the site. Well I just started drinking the Irish red and it came out great, a little hoppy but I ain't complaining (can't say the same for my woman). Went to the TapNY festival and tried a ton of great beers. One that was very interesting was a blueberry wheat from some brewery in Long Island. So interesting I tried the Long Trail Blackbeary Ale, and I loved it. I think I'd like to try to make a very light berry wheat for summer, not sure where to find a good recipe though... the hunt begins
By Jim Edelstein on Apr 1st 2005, 4:14 am Permalink
Brew night number 3 tuesday night. Went even better than expected. Despite little hope I tried to resucitate the liquid yeast I bought and smacked too soon, and it came back nicely! It was also my first time using whole hops, man they smell so much better than pellets, hope the taste diff is there too. Recipe and procedure posted at http://www.tastybrew.com/newrcp/detail/90

Went almost perfectly, and is fermenting nicely now. F.G. was 1.058, color was a little ligher than I expected but I still expect it to come out really well

Now to figure out what to make next
By Jim Edelstein on Mar 29th 2005, 2:02 am Permalink
Been a while, I've been trying without luck to get to brewing my next batch for the last 2 wks.

The kids and wife are in VA for better part of this week, and I'm brewing tomorrow night with a new buddy who really loved my first batch of homebrew. I just started drinking the roasted brown that's about a month old and has been in bottles a little over 2 wks. It came out really really good, I'm quite proud of it and this will be my first chance to show it off. Hard to describe, it's really dark (almost as dark as guiness xtra stout) with good head retention that I expect to be better in 2 wks or so (thats what happened with the stout anyway). A bit of chill haze when cold but you have to look really hard to notice since it's so dark. It's dry (all the roasted barley) and a little sweet with a really nice mellow hops aroma and flavor, minimal bitterness, and good body (1.023). I think the high FG and the massive head is from the malto-dextrin, don't think I'll add it again unless I'm going for high FG.

I was going to use liquid yeast for tomorrow nights brew, but I didn't get to the starter yet and I popped it about a week ago, going to go Nottingham dry yeast instead. Posting the recipe for it now, an Irish Red. I've got the yeast in the fridge, think it's worth trying to resucitate?
By Jim Edelstein on Mar 16th 2005, 5:57 am Permalink
Debuted my first brew (a simple stout) to the wider public this weekend with much satisfaction. One of the guys at the dinner party was actually an ex-homebrewer himself, and he really liked it, drank all that I brought. I've found that although it's a stout, when served cold the mild off flavor (I think tannins due to the way I manhandled the grainsack during steeping) isn't noticable, and it's really smooth and heady. I guess if the brew doesn't come out exactly how you want, but close, you can always serve it cold . I'm going to run out before my next batch is ready, damn.

I also got to bottling the Roasted Brown. FG 1.023, a bit higher than expected, and it's color is more like a porter than a brown. I had a hard time getting a handle on the flavor, its definately unique, but for some reason all the beer I drank that night, including the taste of the hydrometer sample, tasted strangly too sweet, so I'm not trusting my impressions.

I've decided on my next recipe and hope to brew it this week, or beginning of next if that doesn't work out. Going away this weekend or I'd make a party out of it, the two dads at the dinner party I went to this weekend want to help (read: drink a lot of homebrew and puff down) with the next batch. Still have to deal with the f'ed up brew kettle hopefully tomorrow.
By Jim Edelstein on Mar 10th 2005, 5:25 am Permalink
Transfered my Roasted Brown to secondary Monday, had a S.G. of 1.024, seems a little high to me (but I guess I did start higher than I though too). Was bubbling about every 60 seconds.

After I transfered it the bubbling sped up for about 15 min then slowed down to about 75 seconds. Got a little air in trying to get as much as I could out of the primary. Now it has almost stopped, but there is definately pressure in there.

Anyway, I tasted a little and I think it will be pretty good, a bit darker than I intended, I think it's going to come out very dry with a pretty heavy body and not a lot of malty sweetness, good amount of hop bitterness and flavor, roasted aroma. Actually I'm sure I'LL like it, I just hope others will as well.

My Just Stout is almost ready, bubbles still are a little off, but maybe it's just going to end up with poor head retention. It has a funny flavor that stronger with some bottles than others, really can't put my finger on it but the wife had her first taste today and said she could taste the off flavor too.